When English can make perfect sense
Funny links between spelling and meaning
We’ve all, at various times, struggled with spelling English words.
This is without counting:
- apostrophes (which based on my unscientific research sample are wrongly used 90% of the time). And let us not even get into the grand mess around plural apostrophes.
- dependent/dependant errors (which based on my unscientific sample research are wrongly used 99% of the time — especially in official documents!)
However, as I’ve found, the meanings of some words can help reveal the spelling.
I look at 5 words that I often mis-spell, the dilemmas they present, and some ‘creative’ resolutions.
Weird
This word presents weird dilemmas:
- logic loop: is there or should there be a correct spelling for weird?
- Is the correct spelling the wrong sounding one or vice-versa?
- why do we spell this word at all? should there just be an asterisk or something for it?
- What happened to the “I before E except after C” rule?
The key to resolving this dilemma is simple. You have a 50% chance of getting it right. To increase that to 100%, the rule is:
- Write it as you think it should be written — wIErd
- Now swap the E and I
- Voila!
Accommodate
I always get confused as to how many Cs and Ms to include in here. The dilemma here is not so difficult. The short way to remember is that there are two Cs and two Ms.
It is a long word and space is not an issue — so might as well accommodate the double letters, so that they don’t feel left out.
Queue
This is my favourite word in the English dictionary. Phonetically, 80% of the word is redundant. All the following variants sound the same:
- Q
- Que
- Queue
- Queueueue
Easy way to remember, since it is a queue, why not tag on a couple of UEs to the end for good measure.
Ambiguous
Another classic one because - are we indeed expected to be sure of how to spell this word?
Of all words out there, if there was ever a prime candidate for 2–3 accepted spellings, it should be this one isn’t it?
Like Weird, the spelling differs from its sound. The easy way to remember is, especially since we’re talking about uncertainty:
- write it as it sounds — Ambigious
- then replace I with a U — Ambiguous
I mean why squabble over precision. Let us instead welcome ambiguity — if not one vowel, we’ll use another one.
Occasion
The sticking point is the count of C and S in the word. My record for getting this spelling correct averages at 0%. I either get the Cs correct or the Ss correct, but never both.
But as “they say”, there is an exception to everything in the English language.
To resolve this dilemma, we need to take refuge in the above statement. There is no explanation, justification, rationalization, tip/trick that I can offer for this word. Hence, I use the spell-checker on all such occasions.
If you’ve found creative or funny ways to get spelling correct, feel free to share via the comments.
